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Brantford-Brant

Funding is 'great news'

Brantford and Brant have learned they qualify for more than $2.5 million in funding over three years from the province to operate a plan geared to increasing Indigenous-led education in the area.

"This is great news," Brantford Coun. John Sless, chairman of the social services committee, said Wednesday in an interview.

"We have a large Indigenous population in our community and this program will allow them to build their languages and do it on their own terms,"

He was speaking after the committee unanimously backed a staff recommendation Wednesday to proceed with its Indigenous Led Early Learning Plan, which includes a commitment from the Ministry of Education to provide $815,000 annually for three years to the program.

The commitment also contains one-time startup funding of $103,000.

City council will consider final approval on Jan. 30.

The funding is an outgrowth of a provincial action plan called The Journey Together: Ontario's Commitment to Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, announced by the ministry in November 2016, according to a staff report prepared by Michelle Connor, the city's manager of children's services and early years programs, and Kathy Dickens, director of program support and children's services.

The City of Brantford has worked for the past year with a planning committee, made up of 12 partners, to put together the plan and apply for funding.

They put together a three-phase plan to develop an Indigenous-centred early learning program that could be moved into a services hub led by a local Indigenous agency.

The first phase would include the hiring of two cultural co-ordinators and staff with Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe expertise to provide fully subsidized child care modelled on Indigenous culture and teachings.

It would be available to Indigenous families in Brantford and Brant. Right now, five toddlers and 16 pre-schoolers would be eligible for the program.

"We are so grateful to be among the first off the mark to get this plan together and get it approved," said Dickens.

"What is key is that this is an Indigenous-led plan and a lot of agencies were involved. We made sure it came from the Indigenous population. They know best what serves their needs."